


Languages

by Stormchild



Series: Snapshots [2]
Category: Young Justice
Genre: Gen, Implied substance abuse, Mentions of Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-26
Updated: 2013-07-26
Packaged: 2017-12-21 11:13:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 636
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/899618
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Stormchild/pseuds/Stormchild
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Roy’s young, almost every word he speaks is in Navajo. Roy Harper's life in snapshots.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Languages

**Author's Note:**

> This is something I wrote for my clone!Roy Harper roleplay blog. So it's obviously based on my interpretation of him.

When Roy’s young, almost every word he speaks is in Navajo. Every now and then, he’ll let an English word or expression that he heard on the radio slip through. He’s always listening to the radio, no matter what he’s doing, and sometimes he responds.  _"It’s sunny all day today." “It’s raining now, diigis."_ It’s a habit he never grows out of.

When Ollie takes him in, he has to make a conscious effort not to switch back and forth between languages. The first time he slips, he’s talking to Widcat (about Wildcat) and apparently in context it sounds like an insult because Ted turns to Ollie, eyes narrowed, and asks, “what did he just call me?" Roy goes bright red and Ollie shrugs -  _How the fuck should I know?_  - and Ted tries to coax a translation out of Roy -  _I’m not mad, I’m just curious what you said_  - but it doesn’t work. Ted is nice but he’s big but Roy is just fourteen and far from home and not nearly as tough as he tries to look. He doesn’t talk for a week and it’s only been a couple months since Ollie’s taken the kid in, but he can’t help but notice how quiet it gets.

When Roy first meets Dick - a little shy at 10 years old and sticking closer to Batman than anyone else - and then Wally - who actually makes Roy look quiet - he greets them with a bright, “Ya’at’eeh" and they don’t know what it means but they get the gist of it. When he does the same with Kaldur, fresh from Atlantis, the Altantean stutters out a scripted reply and their first meeting is full of uncertainty, both boys thinking that the other thinks he’s an idiot. It’s almost four months before Kaldur musters the courage to ask what it means and snickers but tells him and their friendship takes off after that.

As Roy grows up, his native tongue comes out less and less. Ollie uses it to gage his temperament. When Roy’s angry, he swears. When Roy’s furious, he screams in Navajo without realizing he’s doing it and Ollie has to guess what he’s mad about. He recognizes some words and he’s sure that  _azhé’e_ * is probably the worst one since it’s what Roy seems to call him the most.

By the time Roy moves out of the Queen household, it’s been almost a year since Ollie’s heard him speak anything but English. But as Roy’s storming out, he hears Roy screaming “Tééchaa’i*!" at him and he’s pretty sure he doesn’t know what that means.

It isn’t until a month after they’re married that Jade even realizes that Roy speaks anything other than English. They’re drunk - Roy’s drunk, Jade’s buzzed - and she’s on top and Roy’s arching and writhing and she can’t deny that she likes this angle because of the faces he makes and in between his pants and moans and whines, he lets out breathy whimpers of “t’àà tsjjlgo" and “tha-na-nah" and fuck if it doesn’t make her cum faster than she should.

Roy discovers that the more intoxicated he is, the more he speaks Navajo (and the more he misses his home, even though it isn’t his home and he has no right to, no damn right at all). The first time Kaldur visits after Wally’s death - the first time they talk since before Kaldur left - Roy is too high to realize that he’s even screaming let alone in which language. And Kaldur never learned a word in Navajo past  _ya’at’eeh_  and Roy’s Atlantean is non-existent to rusty at best but that doesn’t stop Kaldur from murmuring apologies and begging forgiveness in his own tongue. They don’t understand what the other is saying but they understand what it means. Roy is hurt and Kaldur regrets it.

**Author's Note:**

> *father  
> *I hate you  
> *more  
> *faster  
>   
> You can find me at mechanicalpoet.tumblr.com.


End file.
